Visions and Dreams
The pier. Ahead, the orange light, hovering somewhere over the water. Or perhaps at the end of the pier. If she could just reach it…
She walked faster, then ran. The pier stretched out under her feet but the light grew no closer. The mist thickened and it was cold. So cold. She slowed then fell, her body stiffening so she thought her bones might shatter. The orange light hung as it had, no closer but still in reach. If only she could get up and keep going. To remain here was death.
Pain followed the cold, both wrapping her in a biting embrace, as the fog thickened to fill her lungs.
“Help me,” she croaked through blue lips and a stiffened jaw. “Help…”
The cold took her until she felt nothing else but it and the agony of her desperate hope, and a voice whispering in her mind from a place deep and dark and older than time…
Find me…
Selena woke thinking some wrathful person had gripped her by the shoulders and was shaking her. She huddled deeper into the covers, clenching her fists around the soft linen, and squeezing her eyes shut against the tears that stung like needles. She took deep even breaths, willing the phantom cold to subside to her usual pervasive chill.
The pier dream. It was no better or worse than some of the others that plagued her, but for its simple, terrible warning. Find the light or die. Selena huddled deeper in the blankets.
When the vestiges of the dream slipped away, she hauled herself to sitting, and brushed the pale hair out of her eyes. The Wayfarer Inn. Her room’s large window revealed a gray and rainy morning. A late summer storm, unexpected after the perfect blue sky of the day previous, boiled over Isle Uago. Selena watched the rain lance against the glass in silver streaks and sighed.
She nearly sank back to the pillows, to bury herself under the blankets and spend the morning hours—or longer—in a half-sleep in which she could eschew the rain, the leering pirates, and the cold, if her dreams showed mercy.
There lies weakness. And Ilior worries.
Neither thought roused her. Some days, especially the long, black days when her wound was new, she stayed in bed.
The wound. Skye had promised this quest would close it.
She promised.
Selena hauled herself up and dressed; pulled on her leggings, undershirt, and tunic. She left her chainmail shirt in the small trunk at the foot of the bed. It would make her colder in the rain. As soon as she was dressed she descended to the common room and asked the innkeeper to brew some coffee.
“In this heat?”
When Selena slid a kroon over the bar, he nodded, snatched it up, and hollered for his kitchen boy to set a pot.
“You mind your pets, now,” the innkeeper warned Selena. “It’s bad enough, the dragonman—” he nodded at Ilior who was already seated at the hearth, waiting for her—“but now a sirrak too? I been real nice since yer coin is good, but…” He leaned on the gleaming wood and said in a low voice. “Don’t you think it’s about time you moved on?”
Selena stiffened. “Yes, I do.”
She left him at the bar and sat with Ilior at a table near the empty hearth. Outside the windows, the wind howled and the rain battered the glass. A sullen, skinny boy wearing a stained apron plunked a mug of black coffee in front of her. Selena wrapped her hands around the mug and let the steam waft over her face. She told herself it helped.
“I haven’t seen Svoz,” Ilior said, his voice a low rumble.
“I sent him to the wilds to feed.”
Ilior picked up a strip of limp, greasy bacon from his breakfast plate. “Don’t let him deplete the boars too much, or I might be deprived of such glorious fare.”
“That is kind of you to make light, when I know how much his joining us bothers you.”
Ilior shrugged his massive shoulders. His lone wing rose and fell. “The success of your quest is too important.”
“If it could only begin,” Selena said. “We are no longer welcome here,” she said with a nod at the innkeeper behind the bar who watched them with a scowl twisting his jowls.
“You want me to talk to him?”
“No. This inn is the finest in Port Sylk. I’m sure some pirate boss has a stake in it. We don’t want to invite that kind of trouble.”
“What next, then?” Ilior asked. “You’ve interviewed every halfway reputable captain on the island, and more that aren’t. I hate to suggest it, but writing to the Temple might be the right thing.”
Selena sighed. “I was thinking the same.”
“Tell the High Reverent to send the Armada.” Ilior’s scaled lips curled. “Her choice of captain wasn’t too keen the first time.”
“She’s doing her best,” Selena said. She’d had the same ire for Celestine, but felt it was her duty to defend her now. “She should have left such matters to Admiral Crane, but done is done.” Selena pushed her coffee mug aside. “But your advice is sound. The rain has let up. I’ll go to the scriveners now.”
“Fair enough,” Ilior said, rising.
“No, stay,” Selena said. “I’ll go myself.”
“That does not seem safe.”
“Neither is staying here. Not for much longer. I need you here in the event the innkeeper has notions about tossing our things in the street. I can buy some time if I tell him we have a ship on the way.”
“I don’t like this,” Ilior grumbled. “It’s the pirate isle—”
Selena held up a hand. “Please, my friend. I want to be alone. For a bit.”
He nodded reluctantly as she rose and started for the door. She felt his scaled hand on her wrist.
“Be careful.”
She knew that every time she ventured alone Ilior considered it a dereliction of the duty he’d assigned himself. Since the war. Since that terrible day where she found the Zak’reth warriors hacking off his wing in the Farendus Isles. She dreamt of that day too, sometimes, but at least she didn’t wake up screaming. In those dreams, it was Ilior who screamed.
She held his hand in hers. “I will. I promise.”
Despite the hidden sun, the heat was intense—or so Selena observed as she walked along the rain-soaked planks of the boardwalk. The smell of fish was trapped in the humid air, as were the scents of salt, sweat, and old rum.
Selena couldn’t feel the wrath of the heat, but she had another misery. It might be a fortnight before an Alliance vessel arrived. A fortnight in which the Bazira trail would grow colder. Moreover, it was a missive of failure she would be sending to Isle Lillomet. Defeat before her mission could even begin.
She strolled the boardwalk, stopping frequently to peer into shops or listen to the hawking of street vendors. Eventually, the scriveners came into view, off the walk and on the docks. Three men sat on overturned buckets, sheaves of parchment tucked under their arms and bottles of ink set on make-shift tables made of crates or pieces of planking before them. Behind the scriveners were cages with peliteryxes, cawing or sleeping, their copper beak satchels glinting dully in the gray daylight.
Selena sighed with resignation, and the scent of pungent but sweet-smelling incense wafted in the air. Without thinking, she turned into the shop from where it came.
It was a small shop, spare in furniture, but rich in wares. Trays of jewelry with gemstones of all colors and sizes were arrayed neatly against every wall. Strings of crystals and beads hung from the ceiling, and shelves of exotic old books and jars filled with unknown plant and animal specimens lined the walls. Fat candles burned low, spilling their tallow over more stacks of books and at the rear hung a tapestry in dark velvet.
A seer’s shop, Selena thought. Isle Uago was flush with them, but this shop seemed finer for its inventory, and also strangely empty.
The tapestry was adorned with stars sewn in silver thread and Selena recognized the constellations, having been taught them at the Temple. The celestial plane from which the djinn of Isle Juskara were summoned was elegantly rendered; a conical outline of silver spangles that tapered to one bright star.
The other shapes: an oval like an unblinking eye, a slant of lightning, and a flaming sword were familiar to her from her days of study as a youth. The other gods. Lesser gods to whom some island nations on Lunos paid fealty. Selena could not recall their names. I disdained learning them, she thought, such is my total devotion to the Shining face.
Selena remembered a chart she had seen at the Guild on Isle Parish. So ancient, it had to be set between two panes of glass lest it fall apart at the slightest touch. It was of Lunos before the Breaking, and three thousand years old. Instead of many islands, there had been one country, wide and whole. Selena couldn’t imagine so much unbroken land, but the archivist had said it was true. The dragons had smashed the world in their war. They shattered it and cast the shards afloat over the vast oceans. The Breaking. The dragons died and the gods came to power, none more powerful than the Two-Faced God who ruled supreme. A moon god to rule over a world of water.
The Two-Faced God’s full silver moon was prominent in the tapestry hanging in this shop before her.
Where it belongs.
But the tapestry’s beauty was ruined, Selena thought, by the inclusion of the Void. There was a blank space on the right side of the tapestry. The Void was a strange, unknowable hole in the sky from which the sirrak came, and from which coppery rocks sometimes fell to Lunos. These rocks were valued for their rarity and brought their lucky finders fortunes in gold doubloons.
“Abysmite,” Selena murmured.
With a stab of fear, Selena scanned the rest of the wares in the shop for unusual copper jewelry, as the rocks were sometimes made into necklaces or bracelets of great beauty…and terrible danger to magic-wielder’s such as herself. Those lessons she recalled with great clarity. Rocks fallen from the Void would deafen her to the god and strip her of her powers simply by touch. She saw none, though she didn’t know if she’d recognize such a rare piece should she find one. She proceeded perusing the shop with caution.
A table made from the cross-section of a tree trunk and finely polished, displayed a tray of jewelry. Pendants and amulets of various design, some exquisite, some grotesque, some so plain that she wondered at their worth, were arrayed on a cloth of black velvet. One trinket caught Selena’s eye; she ran her fingers over a heavy red-gold coin. The edges were rough and uneven but the engraving on the face was expertly done. Selena shivered for the etching was that of a Zak’reth warrior, his face covered in the fearsome visage of a helm forged to look like a ferocious animal, as the warriors were fond of wearing. Her thoughts were swamped with terrifying memories of battles against the Zak’reth and their menacing helms and their weapons that burned as well as cut. She returned the coin to its tray and started to leave.
“Welcome, child.”
Selena flinched and spun around in time to see a slender hand bedecked with rings, pull the curtain at the rear of the shop aside. A woman of middle years stepped forward, her dress of multicolored silk hung in elegant folds around her slim form. She smiled at Selena, her dark, almond eyes warm and sharp. A woman from the Ho Sun Isles in the Eastern Edge. The seer bowed in greeting, her straight black hair brushing her chin.
“You are a fresh flower who does not wilt in the heat,” she observed, her accent thick. “You would like a reading?” The seer gestured to the back room from which she had come.
“Oh no, thank you.”
“Spinning stones speak much for those willing to listen.” The seer smiled. “I can help you, sweet one.”
Selena gave a small laugh. “Unless you have a ship to sell me, I very much doubt it.”
“Not help for out there.” She flapped her hands toward the street. “Help for here.” She motioned over Selena’s head, spreading her arms wide. “Dark clouds over you,” she said. “Dark clouds that never rain, never release. Only threaten.”
Selena stiffened. These seers are all charlatans. She is no different.
But the woman was smiling at her again in such a welcoming way, it brought to mind Selena’s mother before she fell sick. How she’d smile when, as a small child, Selena would run into the kitchen of their fine house on Isle Lillomet, her hands filled with seashells and her mind filled with questions.
“A reading,” Selena said slowly. “I don’t think so. The Two-Faced God is mine. I don’t need the services of the lesser.”
“Lesser?” The woman sniffed. “The stars, they are not as bright as the moon, but they shine still, yes?” The woman cocked her head. “Is it wrong to you, priestess?”
“No,” Selena said. “I don’t know. I have spent most of my life on the Western Watch and am ignorant of the gods save my own.” She looked at the seer. “Do many people keep to gods other than the Two-Faced God?”
“Many people do,” the woman said. “The big moon god is emperor, that is true. Of course it is. So much water to sail. Tides, currents…” She waved her hand.
Selena stiffened. “There is more to it than that.”
“Of course, of course. Your moon god is light and dark, healing and hurting. Light and ice. Many temples on many islands, yes?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “Ah huh. Big god, big power. But not the only magic on Lunos.”
“But the other gods’ magic is weaker?” Selena asked. “Isn’t it?”
“No, no. Not so weak. That coin you admired just now? Very old. Very powerful.”
The woman moved to stand by Selena and her graceful fingers plucked the red-gold disc from its place among many other gems and coins.
“How did you know?”
The woman smiled. She laid the coin in Selena’s hand. “This from Oshkat. He is the god of war and blood and the arts of battle. The Zak’reth’s god.”
The coin felt heavier than its size warranted. “The Zak’reth are my enemy.” Selena set the coin down and wiped her hand on her tunic. “And your god? Not this Oshkat?”
“No. The Ho Sun people do not worship the war god. Shaizan speaks to An-Lan.” The woman’s smile was so warm, so gentle, Selena couldn’t help soften her heart to her.
“Hello, An-Lan. I am Selena.”
“Yes, of course. I foresaw in my dreams. A warrior lady of the big god, come to see me. Strong and powerful, but small and lonely, too.”
“Small and lonely.” Selena sighed. “Yes. I suppose that’s true.”
An-Lan led Selena to the rear of her shop by the hand. “Come. I do a reading for you, bring you some peace.”
“No, no, I shouldn’t,” Selena said. “I shouldn’t give succor to another god.”
“Give succor?” An-Lan furrowed her delicate brows. “I do not know these words, but I know that you are loyal to your big god and so you worry. Do not. Taking a reading is not the same as worship or pledging to serve. Come.”
An-Lan guided her into a small back room with walls of hanging beads and silken curtains. A small table and two small chairs were its furnishings. On the table sat half a dozen lit candles and a small, milky white ceramic bowl with grooved sides. It was covered with strange symbols in pale blue, green, pink, and gold. A lantern hung from above, casting a warm, yellow glow over all.
“Are you not worried about thievery to leave your shop unattended?” Selena asked.
An-Lan sniffed. “I’m no pretender. Anyone who steals from An-Lan will see his cock shrivel, turn black, and fall off!”
Selena covered her laugh with one hand. “Is that true?”
“It’s true!” An-Lan said, and then smiled slyly. “Well, maybe not all true. But the people know stealing from a seer angers the gods. They do not try. Superstitious bunch, all sailors. But to be safe, I have many jewels and stones that are nothing but glass and rock. They are mixed among what is real, and the real are very rare, very scarce. Not many.” She shut the draperies behind them. “You picked a real one. It does not surprise me.”
She guided Selena into one of the small chairs and took the other. From a hidden pocket in her billowy dress she withdrew a small velvet pouch that bore a wide staring eye in silver stitching. An-Lan emptied the pouch onto the table and ten beautiful, perfectly cut oval opals spilled out. Some were milky and flecked with pink, green, and blue. Others were the deep blue-green of the sea, with gold swimming in their depths.
“You want three questions or one?” An-Lan asked. “Three, I think. You have the money for three and you need many answers, yes?”
“I suppose,” Selena said, suddenly feeling very foolish.
“You just wait,” An-Lan said. She scooped up the pile of opals and shook them like a dicer before a throw. “The moon god is not the only god who Hears you, sweet one. Close your eyes and ask.”
“Ask what?”
“Three questions. Ask in your heart and mind, but do not speak them to me. Shaizan shall answer, not I.”
Selena held her hand to her heart, to the cold draft that emanated always from her breast, wondering if it was blasphemous to do this, wondering if the Two-Faced God would be angered by this betrayal, wondering if it was a betrayal at all if her own god would not hear her pleas; and wondering, lastly, if An-Lan was merely a magnificent show woman with a keen instinct for reading people and nothing more.
The cold from her wound chilled her hand. Selena closed her eyes and asked her three questions.
Will I find passage to Isle Saliz?
Will I find love?
How will I close the wound?
The second question surprised her as she hadn’t intended to ask something so irrelevant to her mission. But it had popped into her mind, unbidden, from some deep recess below the wound. A foolish question. A waste. There will be no love for me, not while I bear the wound. But done was done.
When she opened her eyes An-Lan’s smile was gentle, kindly. “Very good, child. And now the god answers.”
Still shaking her hand—the opals clacked within—she put her other on the white ceramic bowl and gave it a spin. It wasn’t a hard spin, certainly not hard enough for more than one or two rotations. Yet the bowl spun around and around, faster and faster, until its sigils were a blur.
“Your first question,” An-Lan said, and tossed one opal of the ten into the spinning bowl.
Selena flinched, half-expecting the gemstone to come flying back out. Instead, it seemed to vanish into the bowl that spun like a vortex. A small plume of pale smoke rose and she watched, awed as an image appeared within the cloudy depths.
A ship under sail rode turbulent waters. The sails strained at their rigging as a storm bore down, tossing the vessel on caps bearded white while lightning flashed above. Selena peered harder, imaging she could see the ship’s crew.
“The answer to your first question is the Voyage,” An-Lan said.
“A voyage?”
“The Voyage. What you see in the smoke are the words of Shaizan. Centuries of study to learn their meaning. This one. The Voyage. A voyage for you. Very soon, you depart. You will travel far…farther than you expect.” She studied the storm-tossed ship with a frown. “Your destination is dark and thick with danger. You are like a light in that darkness, driving it back as the Shining face of your god does when the moon is full. But beware for the dark will try to swallow you, consume you, to make you something like itself. That is all I see.”
The smoke vanished. The bowl slowed to a stop. The opal was gone.
Selena shifted. It means little. A trick of smoke and words to scare me, to lend weight to her ‘vision’ which is nothing more than rumors of my need to get off this island.
An-Lan rattled the nine remaining opals in one hand and set the bowl to spinning again with the other. “Your second question.” She tossed an opal into the bowl where it disappeared into another plume of smoke.
The image that appeared was a man’s face, one half smiling and charming, the other half skeletal with a black oval eye socket and exposed teeth that grinned obscenely. The man wore a top hat such as the kind the troubadours wear at their traveling shows, and behind him were items tossed as if from a juggler’s hand: knives, pistols, and gold doubloons.
An-Lan’s mouth drew down.
“The Trickster,” she said. “A bad omen. I know not of what you asked, but I tell you child, that if a man such as this comes into your life, you would be wise to…”
Selena watched as the seer, as if acting not of her own volition tossed another opal. The Trickster visage disappeared and was replaced by two hands—man’s hands—held out in entreaty.
“Is that the answer to my third question?” Selena asked. “You said I had three…?”
“No, child. Another stone was required for your second question.”
Will I find love? Selena felt her cheeks redden. This is foolish…
An-Lan looked up. “The Supplicant. A confusing draw, I admit. I take it to mean another man, but no.” She frowned, looking at the smoke as though she could see through it. “When I look into the smoke, I see two people and yet…Shaizan is telling me that the Supplicant and the Trickster are linked somehow. In what way, I cannot see. That is for you to know when the time comes.”
Selena nodded, though she could not say she understood what An-Lan or her smoke and stones meant. They mean nothing, she thought but found herself holding her breath when the seer released the opal that was meant to answer the question about her wound. The bowl spun, the opal vanished, and a new smoky funnel rose up.
This time a rose, full-petaled and blooming, with a droplet of blood dripping from its single thorn appeared in the smoke.
“The Sacrifice. A tragic omen. I see a figure lying on the sand, wounded, bleeding. This person will die for you to set you free. That is all I see.”
“Ilior,” Selena whispered, icy dread clutching her heart.
“Perhaps it will be this Ilior. Perhaps not. It is not for you or I to say as we sit here now, comfortable and safe in my shop. When the time comes, you will know.”
An-Lan made to put the satchel of opals away, now diminished by four, and then stopped, confused. She cocked her head as though listening to something only she could hear. “Another stone,” she breathed. She looked up at Selena. “You are powerful, child, that a god, not your own, wishes to speak so much to you.”
An-Lan tossed the opal into the spinning bowl and sucked in a breath as a new image resolved itself. Even without knowing its meaning, the image in the smoke frightened Selena in some deep part of her; the core of herself where the god’s wound truly began.
Blackness. A deep well of impenetrable dark. A hole in the air in which all light died. Even as she stared, helpless to look away, Selena saw from her periphery the candles in the shop dim, their flames growing small until they were hardly more than a pale blue drop clinging to their wicks. The very light in the room seemed drawn to the circle of black, as if it were sucking it in. Selena’s heart thudded with familiar terror.
“My wound,” she breathed.
The seer raised her eyes to meet Selena’s. “This image is called Abyss. In all the readings I have ever done, I’ve never…” She stopped the bowl from spinning by pinching its lip with two fingers. The smoke dissipated. She swallowed and forced a smile. “Well. The god has answered. That is all I see.”
“But what does it mean?” Selena asked. “That question, of all of them, was the most—”
An-Lan held up a hand. “Say nothing to me of your questions. The god has spoken and the answer is silence. More than silence. The Abyss. It is where the gods go to die. Shaizan cannot help you and so then neither can I.”
Selena noticed that over the course of her reading, the woman’s accent had all but vanished and she spoke the Tradespeak with perfect ease.
“My god cannot see if the Two-Faced God does not wish him to see,” An-Lan said in a gentler tone. She took Selena’s hand. “Your god…it has shrouded you. This is true, yes?”
Selena nodded. “It is.” I should have known. But still, the disappointment bit deep, which surprised her.
An-Lan patted her hand and released it.
“Shaizan has spoken more today, for you, than he has all week. I pray you will find answers in his words, when the time comes.”
Selena nodded and the two left the small alcove. She was drawn again to the table where the Zak’reth coin rested.
“Why does it fascinate me so? Because of the war, I suppose.”
“Perhaps,” An-Lan said. “Or perhaps Oshkat is speaking to you as well.” She took up the coin and pressed it into Selena’s hand. “If that is so, it is not my place to silence him.” She gripped Selena’s hand. “You keep that coin, child. You keep it and maybe Oshkat will be able to help you in a way that my Shaizan or your big moon cannot.”
“I shouldn’t. It’s not right. The Two-Faced God…I have pledged my service to it. I wear the Aluren blue and silver.”
An-Lan guided Selena to the door. The shop was still empty. Outside, the clouds were fat and dark, and the air smelt of more rain.
“What you consider the ‘lesser gods’ are gods nonetheless. Their power still exists in this world, child. And it is yours for the taking should you wish to use it.” An-Lan indicated the coin curled in Selena’s fingers. “They are there. Waiting.”
“What does it do? How do I use it?”
An-Lan inhaled deeply and when she exhaled, she opened her eyes. “My god tells me that things will become bad for you. A time when you will think all is hopeless and that your death or defeat is certain. I do not know how Oshkat will help you but I can tell you this: do not spend this coin. Not ever. “
Selena shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
“Go now, Selena Koren. A voyage awaits you. You are a beacon in the dark, child. The smoke spoke true and I see it with my own eyes. Be careful. In the night that is falling, we will need light such as yours.”
Selena turned to go. “Oh! But I haven’t paid you for the reading. Or the coin.”
“The coin of Oshkat is yours. It always belonged to you. It was waiting for you. I cannot charge for what was never mine to begin with.” She grinned. “For the reading, one doubloon, if you please. One gold doubloon. A lady has to keep shop in these rough times.”
Selena turned over the doubloon to An-Lan, though had someone told her she’d pay so much to an Uago seer that morning, she would have laughed at the notion.
“Thank you,” Selena said.
An-Lan touched her cheek. “Be safe, child.” The door closed behind her.
Selena stepped onto the boardwalk and glanced down at the coin in her hand. The rough edges bit into her skin. Whatever An-Lan had said, it didn’t feel right to carry it. Not now. Perhaps someday or perhaps never. She almost let it slip through her fingers, to let it land in the sand beside the boardwalk. Instead she tucked the coin into an inner pocket in her tunic and began to walk.
The more distance she put between herself and An-Lan’s shop, the more unreal it all seemed and she began to feel foolish again. The Two-Faced God has been generous to me, even if I bear its wound.
Selena sighed. The only voyage she would be taking, it seemed, was one back to Isle Lillomet. She strode toward the scriveners.
She didn’t hear the footsteps closing in behind her until it was too late. Rough hands grabbed her from behind, dragging her into an alley that smelt of piss and refuse.
Selena’s hand went to the sword at her hip, but her attackers slammed her into the rough wooden wall that formed one half of the alley. The back of her head struck hard.
“Luxa—”
A filthy hand clamped over her mouth, silencing her before she could weave light. A face pressed in, and Selena saw it was the captain she had humiliated several night’s past. Mallen. One other pirate helped pin her to the wall, while a third stood behind Mallen, a lusty grin on his face and a dented cutlass in his hand.
“Hello, lassie,” Mallen hissed. “Remember old Mallen? We got some unfinished business, you an’ me.”
Selena forced herself to remain calm, but she was held fast and Mallen’s hand on her mouth made spell-casting impossible.
He nodded. “Aye, that’s right. You’re trapped, little mouse, and this time no dragonman to stand between me an’ what I’m hungerin’ for.”
He let go of her mouth long enough to slap her so that her teeth cut her lips, and then his hand clamped down again.
“You stay put, now, and this’ll go easier.”
Selena felt a real pang of fear cut through the pain. She prayed for a passerby to help but just then a bolt of lightning sliced open the sky and the downpour drenched them all instantly. It did nothing to dampen Mallen’s intentions; his rough hand squeezed her breast through her Aluren tunic.
And then Selena saw him.
The tall man in the black long coat. He was standing at the mouth of the alley, partially obscured by a stack of crates. As then, he was smoking a cigarillo but the driving rain doused it. Selena watched him toss the butt aside and then he crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. The rain seemed to bother him not at all. He settled in to watch, and anger burned Selena’s fear away.
Mallen saw her watching something behind him and it was enough for him to loosen his guard. Selena felt the weight of him pressed against her ease a bit. She hadn’t the room to drive her knee into his groin, but she twisted and kicked her heel into Mallen’s kneecap. His roar of pain drowned out the grinding sound of bones breaking, and the pounding rain drowned out both. He stumbled backward and fell hard on his rump with a splat, clutching his shattered knee.
The other pirate holding Selena was smart enough and quick enough to deliver a quick jab into her throat. The pain was swift and jagged. She gasped for air even as she twisted her arm free of the pirate’s grasp, ducking a second blow that would have caught her full in the face.
Her sword was in her hand even before she had found her breath, and she leveled it at the two pirates who now both held cutlasses. She spared a glance at the man in the black coat, in case he was another enemy to be faced. But he only observed, a small, crooked smile on his lips, as if the whole situation amused him.
“Cut her bloody head off!” Mallen screamed from the ground, flailing in dirt and filth that was fast becoming mud.
The pirates moved apart in the narrow alley, one to each side of her, trapping her between them. She took several wheezing breaths but her voice was still no more than a croak. Blood dripped from her mouth and she was soaked to the skin. She brushed away the hair that was plastered to her face with her shoulder and her attackers used the slight lapse to attack. They came at her, one from each side, blades slashing in deadly arcs.
Selena’s sword had longer reach than their shorter blades. They had to come in close, and despite her wounds and the rain and her cold, Selena’s sword flashed with blinding speed. In seconds, both men were bleeding and cursing and backing off to reassess their strategy.
Mallen limped to his feet. “Bitch.” He drew his own blade. The steel glinted as lightning flashed above. “This ain’t goin’ to be easy for you now.”
Selena readied her sword. The alley was too narrow to swing wide unless she chose to jump in the middle of the three men; a poor strategy. And then Mallen’s hand blurred. Selena dodged what she thought was a flung knife and was blinded by shit-stinking mud instead.
Instinct and years of training with the Aluren saved her.
Still blind, she brought her sword up on her left and felt the steel clash with one pirate’s weapon. She kicked out with her right leg, catching the second pirate in the gut. But his cutlass sliced her upper arm and she felt a peculiar tingle—along with biting pain—that was her own hot blood pouring out of the gash. Mallen hobbled towards her and the first pirate was attacking again.
Selena wiped the mud from her eyes and nearly paid for it with her life. The first pirate’s blade whistled at her head and she ducked under, but it was close enough she felt its wind, even in the relentless rain. She jabbed her sword out and felt it punch through the man’s midsection. Her wounded arm screamed in pain from the effort but she pushed it aside as she had been trained to do. Still crouched low, she swept her foot in a low arc, catching Mallen at the shins as he neared. He screamed and went down again in a spray of mud.
Selena retrieved her sword from the first pirate’s midsection and swung upward, coming out of her crouch. Her blade sang as it slid against the second pirate’s cutlass and both weapons thudded against the wall. She held her sword with both hands, pinning his blade. The pirate’s left arm was free and he grabbed Selena by the jaw and slammed the side of her face against the wall. Her cheek scraped against old, splintered wood and she grunted in pain. She pulled off the wall, swung her sword back and then forward, and cleaved through the pirate’s arm below the elbow as he tried to block. The man shrieked into the storm as his arm fell to the mud at their feet with a sickening thump. The front of Selena’s tunic darkened in a wash of the man’s spurting blood. He dropped his sword to clutch at this stump, staggering backwards and howling
Selena found she could speak again, but now she didn’t need a spell or her sirrak summoned. One man lay dead, curled around a gut wound that had bled him out. Another slumped against the alley, holding his severed arm, his face gray with shock. Mallen cowered at Selena’s feet as she leveled the tip of her sword at his throat.
“Tell me why I should spare you,” she said hoarsely, her breath coming in harsh gasps. “Tell me how I won’t find you stalking me again if I let you go.”
“You won’t, I promise,” Mallen whimpered. “I promise you won’t.”
“You will,” said a voice, and then the man in the black long coat swooped down like a raven. With practiced ease, he drew his knife across Mallen’s throat, opening a grotesque gash. Blood poured. Mallen gurgled and gasped and then slumped forward, face down in the mud.
Selena swung her sword to face the stranger, her hands shaking. She had forgotten about him. He paid her no mind, but wiped his blade clean on the back of the dead man’s coat and tucked it back into his belt. He then pulled the collar of his long coat up to better cover his neck.
“How about this rain?” he asked with a grin.
Selena blinked, momentarily stunned silent. “What…Who are you?”
“Name’s Julian,” the man said, offering a black-gloved hand to shake. Selena kept her sword between them. He shrugged, his rakish smile not diminishing in the least. “Captain Julian Tergus, if you want to stay formal about it.”
“You just…killed a man… in cold blood,” Selena stammered.
The man smirked. “Cold blood? This one would’ve jumped you tonight, gimpy leg and all. Maybe bring six men instead of two. Look here.” He bent over Mallen’s corpse, inspecting the inside of the man’s wrist, and then, not finding what he was looking for, he used his knife again to cut away the sleeve of Mallen’s coat.
“What are you doing?”
“There it is. See here?” Julian Tergus showed her a symbol burned into Mallen’s upper arm; a shiny scar in the shape of a lick of flame. “He’s part of a pirate collective. You let him live after hurting him this bad—to say nothing of the humiliation—and he’ll bring the full force of his collective down on you. Don’t know which collective; this symbol doesn’t look familiar to me but…” He glanced about the alley. “It’s best if we move along, smartly now.”
“Should we?” Selena asked, crossing her arms. The cold seeped into her skin like the rain seeped into her clothes. “You just stood there. Watching.”
All traces of humor left the man’s face, diminishing the handsomeness that was cut into his angular features. His hair was dark and somewhat short—the rain plastered it down over his gray-green eyes in the front but his neck was bare. A small gold hoop pierced one ear.
“Yes, I did.”
“Why?”
Julian Tergus was quiet for a moment, and then jerked a thumb to the pirate who bled from the stump of his arm. The pirate’s skin was ghastly white and he moaned.
“You going to do something about him or do you want me to? Not a good idea to leave witnesses.” His hand went again to the knife on his belt where there was also a flintlock holstered and two scimitars hung around his waist.
Selena backed away from Julian to the injured pirate. The rain was letting up. She sheathed her sword and knelt beside the man.
“I had better not regret this.”
She took hold of his arm above the place where she had sliced it off and gripped it hard. With her other hand, she poured seawater from her ampulla over the bloody stump, causing the man to cry out, then sought the sky to where the moon floated, hidden though it was behind storm clouds.
She closed her eyes and murmured. “Illuria.”
An orange hue glowed under her hand, and spread over the pirate’s stump. Selena opened her eyes to watch the skin knit together, leaving a raw, puckered scar.
The pirate rolled his head and peered blearily at Selena. “We were going… to hurt you. Why did you…?”
“You’ve lost a lot of blood,” Selena snapped. “I can’t promise you’ll live.”
“Why…?”
“Because it’s my duty to help,” she replied with a pointed glance at Julian Tergus, who was watching her through the smoke of a fresh cigarillo, shaking his head.
She stood and almost fell, catching herself on the wall. The healing had drained her strength in a way the battle with the pirates hadn’t. She staggered toward the street.
“You can’t let him go,” Julian said, indicating the remaining pirate. “He will bring down his entire collective—” He sighed. “Too late.”
Selena turned. The pirate who’d been staring at the stump of his arm was gone. Another wave of dizziness crashed over her. Julian Tergus made to steady her but she waved him off with disgust.
“Leave me alone.”
When the dizziness passed, she tromped through the mud passed him, stepping over the body of the pirate she’d stabbed, and out onto the street. Sloshing steps told her he followed.
“You know, you could use a little godly intervention yourself,” Julian said, catching up to her in two long strides. He gestured at her face where her cheek was scraped raw, and at her arm that still bled. He held up his cigarillo. “And you sound like you smoke about fifty of these a day.”
She whirled on him and almost fell again. This time, Julian’s hand shot out and steadied her. His voice hardened. “You should have let him die.”
Selena tore out of his grasp. “What do you want?”
“I don’t think you heard my introduction. I’m Captain Julian Tergus.”
She stopped as his words struck home. “A captain. You have a ship?”
“I do.”
“I need a ship,” she blurted. Her head reeled and her limbs felt heavy, as if she were walking underwater. This isn’t safe. Got to get back.
“So I’ve heard,” Julian said. “This entire putrid little island has heard. But you’re in luck. I’m for hire. I’ll take you to Isle Saliz. You and your lizards and your shapeshifters and anyone else crazy enough to sail with you.”
Selena’s hopes soared and then darkened again. “Those men attacked me. And you just watched.”
“Haven’t we discussed this already?”
“Why didn’t you help me?”
Julian Tergus’ expression grew serious. “Because Saliz is no pleasure isle. Because the voyage is long and through rough seas. Because the waters around the island are filled with danger: nasty creatures that have been known to take down ships larger than my Black Storm. And if we make it there with our skins intact for whatever business you have, Saliz itself is a thick tangle of jungle filled with the gods’ know what horrors within.”
“Yes? It is all those things. And?”
Julian peered hard at her. “I wanted to make sure the woman who is going to be taking my crew and my ship into such a dangerous place has the mettle for it. I won’t be doing your dirty work for you.”
The two regarded each other on the street that was still mostly empty. He was tall and handsome and broad-shouldered and skilled with a weapon. But Julian’s gray-green eyes—the color of sea glass or the shallows after a storm—met hers and there was a coldness in them she didn’t like.
“I’m sure the coin I’m prepared to pay would help ease your concerns.”
His cold expression shattered as his face broke out in the rakish grin that bothered her more than it set her at ease.
“That too.”
Selena hugged herself, pondering what to do next.
“Come,” Julian said. “You’re shivering, though it’s hotter than a potter’s kiln out here.”
Selena glanced at him sharply but he pressed on.
“There’s a tavern not three steps yon. It isn’t much to look at but it has a hearth in the common room. I’m sure the barkeep can be persuaded to light it for you, for a penny or three. You can warm yourself over a drink and we can discuss the particulars of our arrangement.”
Selena nodded. “Very well. After you,” she told him, her hand resting on her sword.
He grinned. “If you insist.”
She did not smile back. “I do.”